The Thrones of Kronos

by Sherwood Smith

  “Nothing.”

  “Did she tell you why she would persist?”

  “At first, she said, to follow up on the trial, then she said that I’m in the center of things, and she gave me a lecture on how those in power have no right to privacy.”

  Vannis paused, standing so still Fierin could not see her breathing. But her face did not change, and when she took Fierin’s arm and began walking down the flower-lined pathway to the Gallery, her voice was mild. “A challenge, then. Interesting.”

  “A challenge?” Fierin repeated. “To me?”

  “To those they don’t pester,” Vannis said.

  “If you mean Brandon, they’d have to catch him first,” Fierin said, laughing. “The only time I ever see him is at Ulanshu practice, and sometimes at breakfast. And I live in the same house.” She studied Vannis, then took a small risk. “Only time I see you anymore is when we take our walk, except for those breakfasts. Does he have you doing war-planning as well?”

  Vannis’s lips parted, and she laughed soundlessly. “My time is my own,” she said presently. “What concerns me is what happens when the Suneater attack is done.”

  “Done,” Fierin repeated. “You mean, if we win the war?”

  The shadows at the corners of Vannis’s smile quirked. “My dear, we will be lucky if this war ends in our generation. If we lose at the Suneater, then Dol’jhar will harry the remainder of us out to the Fringes and beyond. And if we defeat the Dol’jharians at the Suneater, we will have all the rest of their allies to find in Panarchic space. Then we’ll have to dig them all out of the planets they’ve taken—despite the Covenant of Anarchy.”

  They reached the Gallery doors. “How dismal you make the future sound,” Fierin said, grimacing.

  Vannis pressed her arm comfortingly. “So we will lay aside the future, and divert ourselves with the wisdom of the past.”

  They were inside then, and the rule of the game must prevail: converse either on the theme or about what one heard. Just as well. Fierin needed time to think it all over.

  They strolled across a low tiled pathway. Glistening walls of water fell at either side, splashing with a hissing roar at their feet. Beyond, the paths forked, and Vannis led them one way, then another. Voices came and went; some whispering, and once, the low laughter of intimacy.

  Fierin saw Vannis’s perfect brow crease slightly in distaste, and they chose another way, the sounds obliterated by another waterfall, this one unseen.

  “Ah.” Vannis smiled. “The metaphoric—a sign of intelligence.”

  “Then let us consider this statement,” a woman said in Tetrad Centrum cadences, “made by a person of refinement some five hundred years before our ancestors left Lost Earth: ‘Perfect happiness in this life is only a state of tranquility that is enlivened from time to time by moments of pleasure.’”

  “I applaud the sentiment,” a man responded with a light laugh. “But I am very much afraid I stand with those who feel that felicity consists essentially in pleasure.”

  “Ah,” sighed an older woman. “But—if you will honor me with your permission to assume the pose of dissenter, for purposes of discourse—happiness, or pleasure if one prefers the auditory harmony, is not the same for everyone. Some prefer pleasures of the senses, others vulgar or refined pleasures, some spiritual pleasures, pleasures of reflection, pleasures of intense emotion, or the pleasures of virtue.”

  “Virtue!” The word was distinct above a smattering of gentle laughter.

  “Virtue,” the woman repeated.

  “How diverting,” a younger voice drawled.

  Meaning, of course, the opposite; Fierin did not have to see the speakers to envision the ironic gesture that accompanied the words.

  “Having caught your interest, my dear, you will permit me to expatiate,” the first woman said, her quiet irony an oblique reproach to the vulgarity of the younger speaker. “I do not refer to virtue so rarefied that it excludes all feelings of joy and pleasure. This kind of virtue repels, does not attract. Though one might respect a virtue that is not accompanied by pleasure, one is not drawn to it.”

  A whisper of approbation greeted these words, then—as often occurred in the Gallery—the speakers’ voices abruptly cut off.

  Fierin became aware of a new voice, faintly heard, rising and falling in a melodic line. Vannis turned her head as if tracking the sound, but when they came to a nexus, she chose a pathway that led down behind a complicated terrace of ferns, away from the singing.

  A man drawled, “Nature seems to invite imitation.”

  “Love diminishes,” Vannis said, her eyes narrowing. “And his partner does not know it.”

  How could she hear that in his voice? Fierin thought.

  “Yes,” a woman—youthful, from the timbre and enthusiasm of her response—answered. “So my tutor, an artist, maintained. She observed how by means of light and shadow nature creates art on water or on polished surfaces. In this manner, early in our history humans were thus inspired to imitate such imitation.”

  She might be young, Fierin thought, but she’s not stupid.

  “Imitation of the Ideal,” the man said, and laughed. “Once a divine notion.”

  “At school we were told that the ancients maintained that their divinities were better served by painters than by poets,” the unseen young woman answered back.

  “A nice strike against his pomposity,” Vannis murmured, her eyes half-closed. “I don’t—quite—recognize his voice.”

  “Shh,” Fierin said, smothering a laugh. “He’s firing back.”

  “. . . the young who are sensitive but untutored cannot at first distinguish the parts in a large chorus; in a painting their eyes do not at first detect the shadings, the perspective, the correct draftsmanship, the harmony of color which go together to impact the senses . . .”

  “Default,” Fierin said in disgust as Vannis laughed softly. “Using her age is a weak shot—” Vannis’s hand squeezed her arm, and she fell silent as they turned in another direction.

  The next voice was immediately recognizable: it was Eloatri, the High Phanist. “You cannot discuss the course of love without reflecting on the impact of surprise.”

  “’Tis our disposition to forever seek new objects,” countered an older voice, one hard-edged under the smooth Douloi cadences.

  “Not, if you will forgive my emendation—”

  “Please.”

  “The seeker sees or feels something not expected, but there is also the more subtle surprise, the ordinary presented in a manner one did not expect.”

  The hard voice said, “So what you’re saying is simply this: that some love what they know. Others love what they don’t know.”

  The High Phanist said in tranquil measures: “We abhor limits. We endeavor to widen the sphere of our presence. We derive great pleasure from looking into the distance.”

  They disappeared, and another turn and another fountain passed by brought again that faint plainsong melody, sung by a distant voice. Vannis drew in an audible breath. A few steps farther, and silence enfolded them.

  Fierin nearly uttered a reaction but remembered the rule. Mentally recasting her question, she smiled at the game. “I had no notion that love and religion shared any interest.”

  Vannis’s head lifted, quick and sharp. “Neither did I,” she said. “Neither did I.”

  They continued walking until the third time they encountered the singing voice, and then Vannis led the way out. She took her leave of Fierin, graceful and smiling as always.

  Fierin was nearly back at the Enclave when it occurred to her to wonder how Vannis knew that Brandon had not been asked for any interviews by the novosti.

  o0o

  Derith Y’Madoc dropped tiredly into her pod.

  “Waste of time?” Tovi leaned across her console, her chin on well-rounded arms.

  “Which dead trace do you mean?” Derith asked innocently.

  Tovi grinned.

  “You should’ve talked
to the Kendrian girl,” Derith said to Nik leaning in the doorway. “You might have wormed something out of her.”

  Nik shook his head. “My instinct was, it had to be a female. And no ajna.”

  Derith said, “The poor thing is ridden by fear. Telos! Spooked me, after a bit. Also made me disinclined to push.”

  “She know where they are?” Nik asked.

  “She sure does. I began with the assumption she knows, and she didn’t even try to deny it. But you may’s well count her as a dead trace, though I think the message will get through to the Panarch that we’re sniffin’ this one out.”

  “Good,” Nik said. “Then it wasn’t a waste of time. At least, not as big as most of our other runs.” He stretched and yawned, provoking a spate of yawns from the others.

  “But much as I hate to admit it,” he said, “it’s Chomsky who broke this further open for us. Omplari snagged it.”

  They saluted the noderunner, who acknowledged their half-joking tributes, his face pale and drawn. Sympathetic ache tightened Derith’s forehead and temples. She knew what brainsuck did to you after a while.

  “There was an experiment. Omilov sent them.” Mog pressed fingers carefully to his puffy, red-rimmed eyes, then said, “Gessinav left logic bombs all over, most of ’em aimed at the Navy. But she spared a little venom for Omilov, and one of her little surprises blew an interesting hole in naval security when one of Chomsky’s divers got greedy. It opened up a way into the Jupiter project. That was my post, and I pulled this out of it.” He gestured at his console. “You decide what it means.”

  The whole group gathered around Omplari’s console. “Go on,” Derith said, clearing away a half dozen dried-up containers of Alygrian tea.

  “They were scheduled by Omilov to perform an experiment way the hell out away from Ares, escorted by the Emris. A frigate. Couldn’t find out what the experiment was.”

  “When was this?” Nik asked.

  “Day of the trial,” Omplari said.

  Jumec whistled. “Got themselves killed in the riots? Gessinav tried to sic baiting crowds on ’em to cover her escape.”

  Omplari shook his head, winced. “All of ’em were logged onto their ship, nice and legal. But no one else. No Marines. Nothing but the Elder. Departed with the Emris, all according to plan. But only the Emris returned.”

  Shock ran through the group. “You mean they took the Telvarna out and blasted them?” Liet’s voice squeaked. “With a Kelly on board?”

  “Don’t know. But using some of the shards of the Gessinav worm, I sent it looking for the Telvarna crew’s movements through the logs. Most telling thing is, some of them were at the Enclave the night before the trial, and the captain didn’t leave until the next day.”

  Nik smiled thinly. “Mog, can you use that worm to track the Emris on that date?”

  “I can try,” he said. “If the system hasn’t found my presence yet, I should be able to get back in.”

  “Do it now, will you?” Nik asked.

  “What’s it mean?” Tovi asked, turning from Nik to Derith. “I think I’ve been working too long. None of this is coming together for me.”

  Derith said, “Either the Rifters were shot—or they left.”

  “In which case,” Nik said, “the Telvarna is the only non-naval ship to leave Ares since the war began.”

  “They trust them enough to let a Rifter tempath go? A Dol’jharian at that?” asked Nik. “With no guards? That big story makes that sort of unlikely, don’t you think? The Dol’jharians want tempaths on the Suneater, and a lot of people think it’s to help run it.”

  “Here’s what you’re looking for, I think,” Omplari interpolated, tapping his console. An ordered structure of windows blossomed on the big screen. He tapped again, and darts of light flickered along flow lines and links, highlighting certain items.

  Nik drummed his fingers. “I knew it, I knew there was some chatzing secret. Look at that! The order to terminate the mission came from the Enclave—from the Panarch himself.”

  “So I guess the Panarch didn’t send them,” Derith said, frowning. “What does it mean?”

  “Now you gotta make a choice,” Omplari said. “I figure I can open one more node in here before we get dumped out, and maybe traced. What do you want?”

  Nik pointed at the log of the Emris.

  With care, Omplari teased it open and they watched the captain of the escort ship try to finesse the Rifter ship back, the laughing denial from the Telvarna’s communications console—the very same Rifter who had mere hours before been released from his murder trial—and then the skip signature of the departed vessel.

  “That’s it.” Jumec growled in anguish. “Dead trace.”

  “You’re not thinking,” Nik countered, prowling around the room. “You saw what the captain of the Emris did. She knew, and whoever passed on the order knew, that the Telvarna had a functioning fiveskip. Otherwise she just would have ordered them to return. Where would they go?”

  No one spoke.

  “But knowing that they had a fiveskip, and a Rifter tempath on board who could earn the price of a planet for going to the Suneater, why didn’t they blast the Telvarna?”

  After a long pause, Jumec said dryly, “You’re right.”

  Nik nodded. “There’s some kind of connection. Something no one has talked about.”

  Liet sighed loudly. “Like what? You think the Panarch was bunkin’ with one of them? All of them, maybe?”

  “Rich perversion even for a Douloi,” someone muttered. “Rifters—a Dol’jharian—the youngster bonded with the Kelly—those brain-burners, maybe?”

  “Does anyone know the gender of the Eya’a?” Liet asked.

  “Or if they have gender?” Tovi put in.

  “And would that matter to a Douloi?” Omplari muttered from the back of the group.

  Everyone laughed, even Nik.

  “Even if the Panarch was bedding all of them, where’s the profit in rizzing him over it?” Derith said. “He’s popular now. Sex stories are only fun when no one likes the person.”

  “She’s right,” Tovi put in. “Dump bad if we do a bed-spy story on the Panarch and there’s no point.”

  “But there is a point,” Nik said, his restless hands touching, tapping, from surface to surface in the room as he paced back and forth. “Think. Think! I don’t care who he bunnies with or how many times, but whatever his connection with the Telvarna Rifters is, the fact they’re connected with him means it’s gonna affect us all.”

  Derith said slowly, “No one high up will talk, you know that. As for the Panarch himself, bet he would grant us an interview, but he’d say exactly nothing. And I don’t have the skill to sting him into revealing anything he doesn’t want to reveal. Do you?”

  Nik shook his head slowly. “Doubt it.” He snorted. “Listen to us. Taking it for granted that we can get an interview with the Panarch. We’ve come a long way from Reginale.” Then he straightened up. “Time for us to go loud, I think. We might flush someone who isn’t as good at hiding.”

  “Teasers?” Liet shook her head. “Knife edge, that.”

  Derith crossed her arms and leaned back in her pod. “Then it’s appropriate we start at Detention, huh? Detention Five. Right where the Rifters lived.”

  TEN

  SUNEATER

  Anaris shoved his chair back and dropped the report flimsy on the heavy carved desk. He smiled, wondering what Barrodagh would make of his apparent interest in disposer statistics. Perhaps he should research poisoned enemas next, to give Barrodagh, already no doubt seriously constipated, something more to worry about.

  A laugh escaped him as he gestured a command. Morrighon looked up from his compad, then passed it to Anaris, who swiftly reviewed the vid of Vi’ya’s first attempt to power up the station and then, again, the vid of his own reaction. He remembered nothing of it save awakening in his bed with a nova-sized headache.

  One thing was certain: they would have to concentrate all his sta
sis clamps around his bed before she made her next attempt. Obtaining more, with Barrodagh’s interest in them, would be too revealing.

  Handing the pad back to his secretary, he gazed at the age-darkened tapestry on the nearest wall, reviewing the interviews—brief so far—he’d had with Vi’ya.

  The calm face, the stance of readiness: those came from years of Ulanshu discipline. Her unpredictable sense of humor and the ability to fence with words: those came not just from the Panarchists, but from the Douloi. Apparently she had been rescued from Dol’jhar by Brandon Arkad’s old lover, Markham vlith-L’Ranja, whom Anaris had met once, briefly. Recalling the quick give-and-take of laughter-punctuated comments, the airy Douloi gestures, the trusting camaraderie of those light-haired and dark-haired young men, Anaris contemplated how events seemed to have created this curious circle.

  Vi’ya had even encountered Brandon, however briefly; apparently his gratitude after the Charvann rescue and the flight to and from Arthelion had not extended to preventing Vi’ya and her crew from being slammed into prison as soon as he’d been repatriated to Ares.

  Anaris dismissed Brandon and considered Vi’ya again. Like himself, Vi’ya had become a hybrid. She was certainly difficult to read for motivation or reaction, which made her interesting. Used to abject fear, hatred, or unctuous toadying, he found it refreshing to interact with someone who made no effort to please him, showed no more interest than one would in an adversary, and displayed no fear beyond a healthy awareness of who held the power.

  On the other hand, she hid behind that calm facade a formidable ability. He knew his own rudimentary psi talents were a candle to Vi’ya’s sun. How was she able to encompass touching the Heart of Kronos, and standing in that room, without suffering the reactions that overcame Anaris whenever any tempath tried? He had not touched the Heart, nor would he—not without learning some way of circumventing the reactions. The drugs Morrighon had stolen from Norio were barely sufficient even at this remove from the Chamber of Kronos.

  He would not, of course, give her ammunition by telling her that he, too, carried the taint of the Chorei. Was there some way to find out what he needed? Then he thought of her ship.